


Orchards of Summer

by gonfalonier



Series: Fagin Productions, LLC [3]
Category: The Terror (TV 2018)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Camping, Chronically ill character, Dirty Talk, M/M, Outdoor Sex, References to Drugs, Threesome - M/M/M, Trans Character, alvin and the shitmunks, references to homelessness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-29
Updated: 2020-08-29
Packaged: 2021-03-06 15:21:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,531
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26181085
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gonfalonier/pseuds/gonfalonier
Summary: Three absolute dinguses go camping for the first time ever.
Relationships: Cornelius Hickey/Sgt Solomon Tozer, Cornelius Hickey/William Gibson/Sgt Solomon Tozer, William Gibson/Cornelius Hickey
Series: Fagin Productions, LLC [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1908679
Comments: 7
Kudos: 28





	Orchards of Summer

**Author's Note:**

> for context: sol is trans (idk how else to write him); billy has EDS; hickey is made of dirt like always. one of the prompts in my writing journal was "a camping trip where none of the participants has ever been camping" and i was like ohohohohoooo i know JUST the chucklefucks for this one. anyway. love you. let me know if you need anything.

Neil says, "No, it'll be great!" as he unloads a bag of gear from the boot of the car. He's chipper, which, to Billy, never bodes well. But they're already out here, he reckons, so he may as well try and get in the spirit. The sack that holds the tent can be mounted as a backpack, so he takes that one, and Sol takes up the heaviest of the bags. Sol tells them, "Tom camps out like every weekend in the summer. He's the master of this stuff. I'll call him if we need any help.

"We're tromping two K into the bush," Billy points out. "I doubt we'll have a signal."

Neil insists, "We won't need help." He shuts the car boot and checks the doors to make sure they're all locked, then takes a healthy pull of water from his canteen. "We are conquerors, boys. Conquistadors."

Billy exchanges a glance with Sol. They're both aware that the pack Neil is carrying consists largely of almonds, Spam, and ketchup. You know, like Cortez. Billy feels a whisper on his arm and looks down to see a mosquito has landed and dug in. He slaps it dead. Conquerors, indeed.

The trek to the camping ground is long, long. Billy has no head for time, but he knows that it takes longer than it should because of him. Not that the fellas mind: Sol in particular seems grateful for the frequent rests. Sol's sleeveless, this top he cut up himself that exposes his sides under his armpits, and even so he's a sweaty mess. Billy feels as though he's trudging through glass, even after a lengthy sit, but the sight of Sol's strong flank makes his mouth water. He's sitting on a stump beside the trail and Sol is leaned up against a sturdy tree, bent double and massaging his calves. Nearby, Cornelius paces and smokes. "You work out, Solomon," Neil points out. There's a sly gesture with his cigarette and then he adds, "I keep telling you, treadmill's no match for this natural terrain."

"Is that what you keep telling me?"

"Just a few of my words of wisdom, mate. Just a few of many."

Sol turns to Billy and says, "Y'see, petal? We didn't have to come all the way out here, we've got a mosquito of our very own right at home." Billy smiles, and when Neil laughs about it, they all laugh together. Neil crushes his cig out on the sole of his boot and then tucks the butt into his pocket. With a smug eyebrow he announces, "Learned that from Steves."

"Ah, your best mate, Rick Steves?" asks Billy. It's all Cornelius has buzzed about for the past three days, a series of articles by His Nibs about camping out through Europe. Canada, Neil argued, is practically Europe, isn’t it. What’s Europe got that we haven’t? More Frenchmen here than there, I’d wager. Such wisdom from the man.

"Laugh it up. Only I can prevent forest fires, right? And when I make the perfect lean-to campfire and construct a camp stove, you boys won't get any of my roasted potatoes. Expertly roasted potatoes."

Sol groans, "Potatoes from where? You didn't bring any, you musk ox." And then they're walking again. As he marches, Billy conjures his plan to steal a kiss from Sol. He would've done it just now if Neil hadn't been filling the moment with jabber. Ahead of him, Sol and Neil bicker jovially. It won't be long before Billy needs to rest again. He's relieved to know it won't be any inconvenience to his friends. His boys.

*

The sun is well into its descent by the time they reach the site itself, a tidy patch of bare earth with a picnic bench and a sign with directions to the water pump. Neil and Sol pause on the edge of the site, while Billy picks his way over to the bench and stretches out on the table’s surface. "Good lad," Neil calls to him. "You restore some hit points. Jeeves, here, and I will set up."

The canopy above him is wavering in his exhausted vision, but Billy still finds it in him to laugh. He closes his eyes against the cresting dizziness and allows rest, real rest, to flow through him. He won't have to walk again today. They're out here for three days and four nights, enough time for the three of them to craft a rickshaw for Billy to be carried back through the trail to the car like royalty. He yawns expansively. His fingers twitch of their own accord, and his knees and shoulders scream in agonizing relief. He waits out the worst of the pain; he sympathizes with his joints and his veins and all the other gearworks inside him that don't have enough machine oil to carry on production. He lets his body have its little tantrum, then, and settle back down to its bar-standard grind of pain, and soon he can hear his surroundings again. Songbirds converse in the canopy, and squirrels chatter and leap branch to branch. Dragonflies drone, chasing one another. Sol and Cornelius are constructing the tent together with only middling luck. Of the three of them, Billy is the problem-solver, which leaves the other two ill-prepared for the task before them. Let them eat cake, thinks Billy as he drifts into a deeper state. He isn't sure if it's sleep; he dreams of a soap opera he used to watch with his mother when he was home from school on bad days.

*

When Billy wakes again, it's twilight, and Sol is sitting on the table with his feet on the bench, munching some almonds. He hears Billy stir and looks over his shoulder with a smile. He says, "Hey you," and holds out his handful of nuts to him. "Want?"

"Water? Then yeah, thank you."

"On it." Sol pushes off and goes to rifle through the pack for the gallon bottle, then pours some out into one of their tin cups. Billy props himself up on one sore elbow and sips at the lukewarm water. He surveys the site, scans it fore to aft. Transformed by Neil and Sol’s efforts, it looks positively inviting. The tent is a great domed thing, bowed downward at the crest from the electric lantern hanging in it. A pit’s been dug for the fire with some twigs for kindling in the center. Billy nods toward it and calls out, “Is that how Steves does it, Cornelius?” Neil flips him off, grinning. Billy licks his dry lips and then grins back.

*

It’s Spam, then. Sol uses his pocket knife to slice up the brick of meat, and then throws the pieces into the pan that’s been sitting on top of the fire for ten fucking minutes. There’s an explosive sizzle with each new slice, and they all flinch and ooh like it’s a fireworks show. Billy thinks, not for the first time, that they’re certainly going to die out here. From a safe distance, Sol uses a sturdy fallen branch with two twig-prongs at the end to push the Spam around the pan and turn it to brown the other side.

Neil already has poison ivy on one shin. He chews gloomily at his meal, all his bravado drained away. Among the supplies they neglected to bring, utensils and plates are the ones they currently regret the most. They’re crowded together at the picnic table, and they’ve splayed open the large British Columbia Back Road Atlas to keep from placing their food directly on the table’s surface. The oil from the Spam is seeping through the pages; Montney Basin is now obscured by a glob of ketchup. Still. Not bad.

“Used to be,” Sol says thoughtfully, “I’d eat this right out of the can, you know. Says right there that it’s already cooked, so I let it be.”

Neil offers, “Didn’t have a stove anyway, did you? Nothing to fry it up in.”

“Ah.” Sol glances to Billy with a smile that’s part sly wink, part apology. “Well, there were always the rigs, you know. If it’ll melt junk it’ll likely do the job on, what, Luncheon Loaf.”

“What’d they even use?” Neil scoffs and takes another bite. Billy winces at the insensitivity of the question, but Sol answers casually, “Burners from the school, mostly. They’d break in, pilfer some equipment, Bunsen burners, the rubber hoses, shit, and then bring them back to the spot. The whole place smelled like mustard, “ he pauses, frowns down at his food, “all the time.” When he lifts his head, the shadow flees. Billy can see it, he can see it scamper into the darkening, thickening woods. Sol elbows him and adds, “That’s why it’s always ketchup for me.”

“Not bad, is it!” Neil’s voice is a trumpet. An overcompensation for being crass. Billy and Sol answer in chorus, “Not bad, Cornelius.” And any day, any time at all, Billy will take not-bad over its alternative. If it’s not bad, it’s good.

Next to him, Sol leans in close to Neil and noses at his cheek. “It’s good, man,” he says. “Don’t worry on it. It’s good. You’re good.”

*

After food, there’s Apple Pie around the fire. Billy watches anxiously as Neil uncorks the used wine bottle and takes the first swig. Apple Pie, that’s Billy’s only contribution to the trip, apart from his sparkling company. It’s a recipe he learned from his late Uncle Sy, an American from someplace way east, a Carolina, and Billy’s made it for every family bonfire since Sy passed on. This is its debut for his friends.

When he swallows, Neil hoists the bottle aloft and yelps, a young wolf who’s just now seen the moon. “Good glory,” he says as he passes the bottle. Sol eagerly takes his pull of the stuff and then shakes his head briskly. “Oh, fuck, that’s it, man.”

Billy smiles down at his lap. He’s pleased they like it. There are two more bottles in the pack Sol was hauling.

For himself, Billy doesn’t drink. His body absorbs so few nutrients already, he doesn’t want to feed it things that will actively destroy it. (Only nutritious things. Like potted meat.) He waves away Solomon’s offer of the bottle, but he does move closer to him, close enough for Sol to get an arm around his shoulders and pull him in. Sol smells like clean sweat when Billy tucks his nose up against his neck. He can feel Cornelius watching them; he can feel the mood start to turn. The sun is nearly set, gold to pink to violet, the vast sky draped close to the treetops, or the pines unfurling higher in the evening cool. Billy knows how they feel: Withered by the tawdry heat; sustained by what comes after.

When Billy tips his head back and pushes his lips against Sol’s it’s as good as any kiss he might have stolen in a quiet moment before. It’s a physical thing, the force of Sol’s attention, Sol’s want, and it pours into Billy from the kiss, into his mouth and down his throat to pool in his chest and then it spreads out to the rest of him. He swings his legs into Sol’s lap to anchor him there. “Don’t go,” he mutters into Sol’s mouth, as though there’s any chance. Sol shushes him. They kiss deeply, thoroughly, until every trace of alcohol taste is gone from Sol’s tongue.

From his place by the fire, Neil says aloud, “Undress him for us, Sol. Let’s have a look at him.”

“I will when I’m ready,” Sol snaps. A thrill shivers on Billy’s tongue. Solomon always has been territorial. Sol turns back to him and says, more gently, “When you’re ready. When you’re ready, sweetheart.”

“I’m ready.” Billy cranes up and noses along the ridge of Sol’s brow. He kisses him there and then returns for another kiss on the mouth. “Lay me out.”

“Table,” grunts Sol, and Neil makes an agreeable sound. Billy feels himself being heaved up then. His head lolls back and his legs dangle over Solomon’s arm. Sol says, “Christ. You’re nothing but bones, man, how are you this heavy?”

“Well, there go your chances. Brute.”

“You love it.” And then Sol deposits him on the surface of the picnic table. He’s right, of course. Billy does love it. He loves his lout Sol and his clever Neil; neither of them truly his, but both sworn to him through years of friendship, sex, recovery, violence, poverty, and the end of poverty. That they’re here now, enjoying one another without fear or hunger, testifies to Billy the power of, if not love, then at least homosexuality.

His legs swing from the edge of the table, but Neil picks one up and props the sole of his shoe against his chest. Down the rangy length of Billy’s body, they smile at each other. Neil undresses his foot. He sets the shoe and sock aside, and then noses the underside of his toes. Billy has no idea how he smells; the thought nauseates him but the sensation’s intoxicating.

Neil pulls himself up straight and looks over to Sol. He’s still cradling Billy’s ankle in his palm, and now he’s drawing his fingertip up and down the center of his bare sole. “Well, Solomon,” he says. His eyes are shining in the firelit dark. “What are we going to do with this one?”

“Hm.” Sol hugs one arm across his chest and props his other elbow up on it so he can give his scruffy beard a thoughtful stroke. “Spoiled for choice, aren’t we. Lots to fiddle with on a lad like this.” He nods to Billy’s foot in Neil’s hand. “You’ve got a head start. I need to catch up.”

From his supine position on the table, captured and helpless, heavy with desire, Billy gasps, “Please. Please catch up.”

“Pipe down, now.”

“He’s spirited tonight, isn’t he.”

“Like a horse, I’d say.”

“Then let’s set about getting him wet and broken. How’s that.”

“Shouldn’t take much, the way he likes it.”

The two men smile at each other, criminal conspirators, and then set upon Billy to strip him of everything he has.

*

The fire, neglected, has reduced itself to a smolder. None of the three men have noticed. Billy’s head is propped up on a pile of folded clothes so he can watch Neil work between his legs. Sol’s straddling the bench and leaned back on one hand, rubbing himself off with the other. Billy’s got a view of that, too, in the moonlight, Sol playing his cock, such as it is, between two fingers in lazy pulls. “Is he treating you all right, flower?” he asks Billy. “He got you in the groove?”

“Yeah,” Billy hears himself sigh. “Yes. Yes, yeah, he’s got me. You’ve got me, my love. You’ve got me.”

Neil is deep in concentration. His hair swings with each juddering thrust and sticks to the sweat on his cheek. He’s got Billy spread open so he can watch where they’re joined, watch them join again and again and again. Billy’s got one long, bare leg draped over Neil’s shoulder, and the other is clutched in Neil’s hand. That leg, he’s still got a sock on.

Neil isn’t a talker when he fucks. He’s a machine, focused and sharp. His mouth is screwed tight. He and Solomon are practically Gallant and Goofus side by side. Cornelius is all sinew and tendon, straining with heated effort, glowing in the dark like the aura before an ecstatic migraine. From his spot on the bench, however, Sol cuts the figure of a decadent Roman. He’s loose, at ease, grinning between lascivious snarls. That damnable rag of a t-shirt’s still on him, and every couple minutes (time isn’t real) he releases his prick and palms at his chest, exposed by the skewed arm-holes, and the fluid gathered on his fingers shine there. Where Neil is wiry, a prairie jackrabbit, Sol is a housecat seeking nothing but rest and pleasure and a warm spot to curl up.

Swinging his leg over the bench to face the table, Sol sucks his fingers clean and then turns his attention to Billy’s body, shuddering with the force of Neil’s pistoning hips. “Now, now,” he drawls, stroking through the sheen of sweat on BIlly’s inner thigh. “Not too rough now, Neil. You’ll fucking subluxate the lad.”

Neil parts his tight lips and grinds out through his teeth, “Shut the fuck up.”

*

Billy’s pelvis is still fixed in place when his two companions help him limp to the tent. Compared to the grit and grain of the wooden picnic table, the bedroll they stretch him out on feels like a feather bed. They push their mats in to line up with his and lie on either side of him. He’s still feeling the effects of his climax; that delectable wet, hot fullness Neil poured inside him makes him feel impossibly high.

He and Sol kiss, tongues passing sweetly over one another and over lips and teeth and, when they miss, cheeks and noses too. Sol’s got two fingers tucked up behind Billy’s balls where he can play with the puffy flesh of his hole. “Will you let him in, treasure?” Neil asks into Billy’s ear from where he’s spooned up behind him. “Shame he can’t fill you up again, isn’t it. You love a mess.”

Billy protests, “I don’t,” but it’s weak. Against Sol’s mouth he mutters, “Please. Please be inside me. Please, Sol.” The two of them grunt together when Sol pushes two fingers in and twists.

“He fucking filled you up,” rumbles Sol. “He’s right, isn’t he, you do like a mess.” Billy clutches Sol’s hip and nods and whines. Sol knocks their sweaty foreheads together and stays there. He bares his teeth when he says, “When we get home, you know what I’ll do? I’ll make you write lines. Write out lines like a fucking schoolboy, that’s what I’m gonna make you do. Make you write out, I’m a messy slut who loves to get fucked.”

“Christ, mate,” Neil stutters.

“I am. I am. I’ll write it down because that’s what I am, and you know it is, you both know.”

“Yeah,” coos Sol, “we know, sweetheart. It’s why we take care of you like this. It’s why you let us.”

“Sol. Solomon.” Billy tries to spit it out, that right on the comet’s tail of his first paroxysm he’s about to hit another one, but it happens before he can announce it. His breath hitches in hiccups. He tips his head forward onto Sol’s shoulder, exposing the back of his neck for Cornelius to kiss.

They’re crowded in close together. Billy can’t stop sobbing against Sol’s chest, where his tears mingle with the grime of the day in his shirt. He’s wrung out. His whole body is going to hurt once he comes down, so he enjoys the freedom from pain while it lingers. Neil shifts behind him, pushes himself even closer, and then Billy hears him kiss Sol and tell him something that sounds tender but, the way those two are, it could be anything.

*

“How’s the water from the pump?”

“Could be worse. Like mineral water, kind of, but none too strong.”

“We’ll use it tomorrow to boil some dry leaves for breakfast, I guess.”

“Oh, hilarious, you. I brought a thing of oats, like for oatmeal.”

“Gentlemen, I look forward to shitting arm-in-arm with you the next few days.”

“We could put some Spam in the oatmeal, couldn’t we! What does Rick Steves have to say about that, Cornelius?”

“You can both fuck off and eat squirrel for all I care. Cunts.”

“Maybe Sol can spear us a fish tomorrow.”

“Ah, yeah, I’ll get to whittling my harpoon now, shall I?”

“Or maybe a bear!”

“Don’t fucking talk to me about bears, man, I’m scared to death of the things.”

“Oh, what a fucking relief, then, that you brought us out to the middle of a forest full of trees and caves, two things bears notoriously hate.”

“Boys, please.”

“Sorry, William.”

“Sorry, Billy-boy.”

“We tied the trash up? And the food?”

“Tied it up.”

“Put the fire out?”

“It’s out and about.”

“Then we should have no encounters with a bear of any sort.”

“Lovely.”

“Not even a ghost bear?”

“Solomon.”

“I’m only asking!”

“Slather you in honey and send you out there to get mauled. Ghost bear. Fuck off.”

“Ghost bear doesn’t eat flesh, though, do it. It hungers for souls.”

“Then it’ll find no sustenance in this tent! Both of you, please do shut the fuck up.”

“Oh! Oh dear, oh dear.”

“Well, now we’ve gone and done it, haven’t we, Sol.”

“Seems we have. And here I was hoping to go another round tonight.”

“You’re both disgusting. Sweaty. Awful. No, get off me. Get off me or I’ll send you out to fight the ghost bear.”

“Shan’t.”

“I’m not budging.”

“This was a mistake. Just a terrible idea.”

“Do you know, Billy? I’ve really, truly got to disagree.”


End file.
